The Romantic Armchair Traveller

Mongolia: Warrior by Zoë Archer

Although paranormal romance is a subgenre I tend to avoid, the Mongolian setting and review comparisons to films like the Indiana Jones franchise and The Mummy whetted my interest in Warrior, the first installment in a new adventure series called “The Blades Of The Rose” by Zoë Archer. Having read the book, I am in two minds about picking up the next. Ironically, I felt the romance got in the way of the plot, and ardently wished the entertaining elements of magic would inspire more frequent, suspenseful escapades. As it is written, despite a cover and title that seem to reach out beyond the romance reading community, Warrior is too overwhelmingly purple in its pushing of the romantic plot for me to believe in its crossover possibilities. That said, there is much that is excitingly fresh about Archer’s story.

 

1874. Nursery tales and legends are how most people think of magic, never dreaming it truly exists. The Blades Of The Rose are sworn to protect Sources, the objects that are repositories of this secret and mystical power, and prevent their exploitation by those who employ magic for destructive or selfish ends, such as the Heirs.

After being entrusted with a cryptic message and an unusual compass by a dying stranger, newly resigned Army Captain, Gabriel Huntley, travels to Mongolia to deliver them to another man he has never met. The news he brings causes great perturbation. The recipient is incapacitated by an injury, but his daughter, Thalia Burgess, assumes the responsibility of taking the action required. Although Gabriel insists on accompanying her on the dangerous journey she sets out on, she remains secretive about her mission even after attraction blazes up between them. Only when they are nearly killed by forces of nature about which nothing is natural does Gabriel learn of the unseen truths Thalia has known all her life.

Used to command, Gabriel also has to learn to work together with Thalia, whose ambition is to become a Blade like her father. But are they resourceful enough to defeat the Heirs, who will stop at nothing to wrest a long-lost Source from its hidden location and turn Mongolia into a nation of slaves?

 

The creatively integrated and studiously-researched setting of Warrior exceeded my hopes. Mongolia is not merely an exotic backdrop for a story that could take place anywhere. Its history and culture actively drive and enrich the plot. While natives play only subservient if prominent roles (is it really so impossible, in genre fiction, to write a native secondary character whose plot function includes being a leader or decision-maker or an otherwise positive, active role model in his or her own right?), this is still one of the best uses of setting I have read in any romance.

From the metallic wasps of the first chapter to the actual Source, the elements of magic Archer weaves in entertained me throughout the book. While some of the phenomena such as the thunderstorm and the raging river drew on overly familiar imagery (the sandstorm in The Mummy (1999) and the water creatures in The Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship of The Ring (2001) and The Chronicles Of Narnia: Prince Caspian (2008)), as dramatic scenes they nevertheless crackled with energy and revealed the author's strongest talent: fantasy-based adventure writing.

If that vigorous storytelling had been sustained throughout the story, I would have devoured Warrior in one sitting. But this adventure-laced road romance is instead hampered by stop-and-go pacing that leaches the life out of scene after scene. Between brief bursts of action are long, sluggish segments which are so lacking in conflict that any tension evaporates. (The random attempts at humour fell flat for me: Gabriel is no Indiana Jones and Thalia no Evelyn.) These pacing problems are exacerbated by the handling of the romance, which mostly consists of incessant lusting that inserts itself into every situation, constantly interrupting the flow of scenes, including dialogue. I find, for example, that I have little patience with dialogue where a brief utterance is followed by half a page or more of internal monologue before the next sentence of dialogue follows, again to be slowed down by paragraph after paragraph of more internal commentary. This tedious pattern repeats itself throughout the book.

A problem I sometimes encounter in novels where magic plays a central role is the lack of intellectual effort on the part of the protagonists. When magic miraculously saves the protagonists or the antagonists from a tricky situation or the use of a magical device or power solves a puzzle or overcomes an obstacle, the characters sometimes begin to resemble marionettes whose moves are solely dictated by external causes. In Warrior, instead of busying themselves with strategizing or otherwise exploiting their intellectual abilities to further their goals, the hero and heroine spend their “thinking” time (I use the world very loosely) focussing on emotional reactions – either lust for sex or lust for revenge.

Some people are action-oriented rather than thinkers, and that certainly applies to Gabriel and Thalia. Unfortunately, the conspicuous lack of action for long periods at a time meant I was saddled with their one-track mental processes. In consequence, I often grew bored to the point of indifference. What kept me going were the tidbits about Mongolian life and the acknowledgement that, as much as the romantic interaction between Thalia and Gabriel failed to engage me, these are two mutually respectful and unfailingly supportive characters. I may have gritted my teeth as I read about Gabriel’s “golden eyes” for the twentieth time or was jarred by the fond use of “bloke” when all the characters – including Yorkeshireman and collier’s son Gabriel – speak as if born in the modern United States*, but I enjoyed that there were no silly misunderstandings or contrived quarrels between this couple: their romance is so conflict-free there is not even a “black moment”. While their relationship never develops beyond physical attraction and admiration for each other’s unconventionality, their devotion to each other's welfare and happiness is not in question.

The balance between fantasy and history in Warrior is firmly in the former’s favour. Gabriel and Thalia may live in a historical period but their modern sensibilities are not conducive to a particularly nineteenth-century atmosphere. Thalia’s Mongolian surroundings may have freed her from the manners that define – or confine – other British women, but although the story shows she is well versed in Mongolian customs this different cultural influence has apparently had exactly the same effect on her attitudes and outlook as a 21st century western upbringing would. Interestingly, the lead villain, evil-natured though he may be, comes equipped with convincing motivations that are perfectly suited to this empire-building period.

The final chapters of Warrior set up the future installments in the series, introducing, for example, the heroes of Scoundrel (a rake whose portrayal in Warrior makes him indistinguishable from a dozen other rake heroes) and Stranger (an inventor whose character offers potential for interesting complexity). The author devises a clever way of including these elements without diluting the finale, and I am glad to report she also closes the story without resorting to cliffhangers.

As stated earlier, I am not easily drawn to paranormals. Nor am I a fan of series since I tend to want closure, new settings, and unfamiliar characters. Paradoxically, within the romance genre the only series I have invested in actually happens to be paranormal historical: Shana Abé’s "Drakón" series. In other words, I can be won over. In Warrior, I appreciated the strong setting and the thoroughly entertaining combination of magic and adventure. On the downside, I had serious issues with the intrusively lust-focussed romance and found it difficult to remained absorbed in the story when the action slowed. Since the next book features a non-fake rake hero, even the enticing location - the Greek archipelago - is probably not enough inducement to persuade me to give it a chance. I still have my eye on the inventor’s story, though, because I do think Zoë Archer shows a great deal of promise.

 

*Other language-related irritants, for me, were the notion that Thalia’s English is tinged with a foreign accent (she has spoken it daily with her British father since infancy) and the speed (a couple of weeks) with which Gabriel acquires advanced conversational skills in Mongolian (the scenes with the bandits).

 

Excerpt

(Zebra Books paperback, 2010, pages 96-7)

"One moment, she had closed her eyes, the next, she was being gently awakened by Gabriel's hand on her arm, dawn light gilding his shoulders. She couldn't think of a better way to greet the morning.

'We should reach Karakorum today,' Thalia said after she had rinsed her mouth with water.

'Thank God,' Gabriel muttered. 'I've nearly pulled out half my teeth chewing on that dried mutton.'

As Thalia swung up in the saddle, she grinned. 'The Mongol horsemen used to soften borts by putting it underneath their saddles as they rode. We could try that to make it more palatable.'

Gabriel made a face. 'Dried mutton and horse sweat? Even enlisted men were fed better. It's grounds for mutiny.'

'I hope not,' Thalia answered. 'Flogging is so time consuming.'

By late afternoon, they had entered a broad valley, through which flowed the Orkhon River. Thalia had been to the Orkhon Valley before, but its beauty always filled her heart with lightness. Small stands of trees clustered on riverbanks bright with sun. Scattered throughout the valley were groups of gers, smoke rising from their chimneys into the sky. A shepherd on horseback tended his cattle, and the echoes of their lowing could be heard across the basin. A few monks from the monastery had left its walls and were taking their leisure by sitting in the sun on the grassy knolls, their robes spots of flaming color against the green.

'A lovely spot,' Gabriel said. 'But where's the city?'

'This is it,' Thalia answered. She gestured to the wide plain. 'Karakorum.'"

 

Ireland: Surrender To An Irish Warrior by Michelle Willingham

Irish-set romances are a comparative rarity, and since I continue to search for a convincing mediaeval romance, I choked down my annoyance with yet another objectifying romance cover (and awful Harlequin title) and gave Surrender To An Irish Warrior by new-to-me author Michelle Willingham a chance. By now Willingham has set several stories in twelfth-century Ireland, so I was hopeful that in this latest work her research would have attained a level that spares the reader the most common novice anachronisms.

 

1180. A Viking raid against the Ó Reilly clan’s home has left their village in ruins and Treharn MacEgan’s betrothed dead. On his way there to find out what happened and hunt down the perpetrators, Treharn is sidetracked by a desperately ill woman who is hiding from the world in an isolated forest shelter.

A victim of the raiders, Morren Ó Reilly’s resulting pregnancy ends in a miscarriage that might have claimed her life, too, if not for Treharn’s ministrations. Only anxiety for the fate of her one remaining family member, a young sister, who has disappeared while out seeking for help for Morren, persuades her to face people again. But even if her sister is found, and the dead are avenged in blood, neither Morren nor Treharn have faith that they will ever be able to rebuild their shattered lives. And then, just as their mutual support evolves into a fragile hint of something deeper, a devastating revelation forces them to once again re-evaluate what it means to belong.

 

The good news is that Surrender To An Irish Warrior is not a dress-up mediaeval. The better news is that the characters and their interactions are complex, realistic, and appealingly mature, creating a solid, compelling romance even when the clever but unevenly balanced plot peters out into an anti-climactic finale. I hope Michelle Willingham switches to writing single titles one day because I would like to see what she would do with a bigger storyline and a page count that accommodates a more ambitious historical background. If she works on her historical details for a more sharply defined period authenticity, who knows where her career path could lead in the future.

For now, however, Surrender To An Irish Warrior is very much a historical romance as opposed to a romantic historical. As in any romance, the love story is the core and focus of the book, and the category length adds to pushing history to the background both in terms of quantity and depth. What separates the history in Surrender To An Irish Warrior from commonplace historicals is that whatever period flavor is included has not been converted into a theatre stage with modern actors performing in front of historically-themed set paintings. Willingham’s characters form part of a mediaeval landscape, which, while dodgy in some of the specifics, is sincerely conceived, with research efforts integrated in a smooth, unforced way.

By 1180, Normans had taken over as the chief invaders of Ireland, but Willingham chooses to take as her subject the uneasy friendships that centuries of interactions had developed beween Irish tribes and Viking settlers. Placing Morren’s home - a cashel, or ringfort - and a neighbouring Viking longphort in southwestern Ireland, some miles upriver from modern-day Bantry (Surrender To An Irish Warrior, page 53), and the MacEgan's fictional tribal kingdom somewhere in the vicinity of Trim, she shows the effect intermarriage and trade has had on building relationships where formerly only enmity and rivalry existed. One of the key aspects that made Surrender To An Irish Warrior very sympathetic was that both principal and supporting characters reason through problems together and listen to each other, showing how tolerance and understanding can grow wherever ordinary decency and goodwill are allowed to exist.

Refreshingly, scenes which another author might seize on as the perfect excuse for launching the Big Misunderstanding are quietly turned into opportunities for characters to confront their feelings in an open, honest manner. This is particularly the case with Morren, whose pain, vulnerability, and debilitating burden of shame never blind her to the importance of being truthful or admitting her own mistakes. For example, she realises that in trying to keep Jilleen (her sister) safe from danger, she has inadvertently fostered a deep-seated fear in the girl even of their own clanspeople; as a result, she takes steps to correct this despite the hardship it means for herself.

With the imagination of a bard and the hardness of a warrior, the character of Trahern combines thoughtfulness and combativeness. While he shows delicacy in supporting Morren through her plight and is very understanding of her fears about physical closeness, his drive to exact vengeance plays a part in all his actions. As he reminds Morren, he is no saint. While the actual timeline from the couple’s first meeting (early autumn) to their first sexual encounter (shortly before the end of October/Samhain) felt too short to me for true believability, on the actual page the friendship and love between Treharn and Morren develops at a reasonable pace. The absence of mental lusting in the earlier parts of the book (thank you, author!) was as appropriate to their situations as it is unusual in romances.

If there was one thing that disturbed me about the romance between Morren and Trahern, though, it was the relationship of protector and protected. As a rape victim, Morren’s trust in people has been severely damaged and the matter of personal safety is a constant source of anxiety. As someone who has lost the woman he loved to violence, Trahern is ever vigilant about Morren’s wellbeing. Thus, he protects her and she comforts him. Eventually, the constant emphasis on this dynamic seemed to imply it constitutes normal and sufficient reason for a sound love match. I have a problem with that view.

Wounded spirits in all honour, but Morren’s internal reflections about how Trahern is protecting her and making her feel her safe go beyond a matter of needing reassurance. They are relentless, unquestioned, and persist throughout the book. Every time she looks at, thinks about, or interacts with Trahern, she seems to dwell almost exclusively on being kept safe by him. What other qualities she loves or admires about him besides his protective abilities (and storytelling skills) are never really explicitly stated - if they are stated at all. Even Trahern’s storytelling is described as having a protective effect, “weaving a spell around her grief”. When Morren looks at him, she gratefully sees someone who is willing to“lift the world on his shoulders for her.” Throughout the story, Treharn’s attitude encourages her passivity: “Last night, when she’d taken refuge in his arms, he’d wanted to shield her from the world” (page 215). I wish Morren could have been shown to apply (to her own situation) the lesson she learnt from Jilleen's reactions.

In fairness, it is only in this one aspect that I thought Morren’s personality limp. She does of her own accord resolve to face her demons, and repeatedly insists on taking part in seeking out and challenging the guilty. In the final, physical confrontation, she acquits herself capably.

While Willingham’s prose is serviceable it does not avoid some convenient clichés, and this inattention slips the author up, I think, in two cases. Firstly, it is unsettling, in a love story which attempts to deal sensitively with the issue of rape and its destructive consequences, to find the language of conquest and domination that is often so indiscriminately used in romance writing to convey male passion. Deep into the story, although Morren has actively invited Trahern’s kiss, the encounter is described in terms of an exercise of power: “Hungry and heated, he captured her mouth, coaxing her to surrender.” Secondly, Trahern is a bard whose mastery at holding his audience spellbound is commented on several times. It is a little unfortunate that the actual examples given of this supposed skill are noteworthy for their lifelessness.

Apparently, Surrender To An Irish Warrior is the concluding installment in a series about the MacEgans. There is absolutely no need to read the previous books in order to understand what is going on in the last. However, characters from the other books do appear in this one. Although there are acceptable plot reasons to justify their presence, the story does - in common with the typical series family reunion - tread water for a while as the marital bliss of the other couples is being demonstrated. Another instance where the narrative tension slackened came toward the end, when the realism that had set the tone for the story up till then was changed in favor of fairytale rosiness. In my case, it subdued the emotional impact of the ending.

All in all, while Surrender To An Irish Warrior did not bring my search for a satisfying mediaeval historical romance to a conclusion, neither did those of more famous names (Madeline Hunter, Barbara Samuels); moreover, I enjoyed myself too much to be disappointed. Michelle Willingham gave me compelling characters and a poignant love story, and within the confines of a short page count worked hard to integrate these with a realistic setting. If she chooses to continue writing short historicals, I suspect she has every chance of becoming very successful at it. But if she is interested in developing her talents in a slightly different direction, there’s this author named Elizabeth Chadwick whose early career shows how one can learn to combine romance and mediaeval history without sacrificing either...

Portugal: Marrying The Royal Marine by Carla Kelly

Carla Kelly’s Marrying The Royal Marine presented a mess of problems for me, and I struggled quite ridiculously to finish it. Had this Regency historical romance been the first book I read by the author I suspect it may have remained the last.

 

1812. The illegitimate daughter of a national war hero, eighteen-year old Polly Brandon has felt unwanted all her life. Her newfound sisters are loving but married and have their own lives. Hoping to be of service in the army hospital in Oporto where her brother-in-law is chief surgeon, she is billeted aboard a navy frigate bound for war-torn Portugal. When she falls violently seasick the task of caring for her is assumed by the only other passenger - a man.

Lieutenant Colonel Hugh Philippe d’Anvers of the Royal Marines is voyaging out to the troops in the Peninsular war on an information-gathering mission. As he looks after Polly he begins to see beyond her spectacles, and she beyond his handsome looks, and they become friends. But once in Portugal their responsibilities and uncertainties about the other person’s affections conspire to separate them. Until they meet by chance during a dangerous trip upriver to retrieve patients - and their capture by the enemy forces the pair to invent a marriage to protect each other.

 

The setup of Marrying The Royal Marine assumes familiarity with the two previous romances in the trilogy. I have read the first, Marrying The Captain, but not the second, The Surgeon’s Lady, which meant not only that some of the references in Marrying The Royal Marine puzzled me, but also, since scant clues are provided, that I never figured out exactly how or when Polly had been reunited with her sisters. As it turned out, this missing background was the least of my issues.

For a love story to hold credibility for me when either of the parties is very young and the age difference is significant, I have to believe that the younger person possesses a good dose of independence and intelligence, and that this is what draws the older person to him/her. Jane Eyre is a classic example: the heroine’s trials and tribulations have matured her beyond her years and her passionate nature is combined with a strong, independent, gifted spirit. Joanna in Here Be Dragons by Sharon Penman is allowed to mature before the marriage is consummated, and the road to that point (and beyond it) is realistically thorny.

Marrying The Royal Marine is not quite a May-December romance, but at the age of 37, Hugh is nineteen years older than eighteen-year old Polly. By the end of their sea voyage he has decided that he wants her to “mother his children” (page 88). Now, during much of this trip Polly has been ill and helpless. Hugh has had to both wash her and help her dress. Once she recovers sufficiently to go up on deck, she is still too weak to do much beyond lounging in a canvas chair. He comforts her when she fears the ship will sink in bad weather and teaches her how to walk and retain her balance aboard a rolling ship. In all this, he is kind and does his best to put her at ease. He could have done no better had he been a doctor or a relative.

He is not, however, a doctor or a relative. Yet even after Polly has recovered, he presumes to cup her cheek, chuck her chin, button the back of her dress, push up the spectacles on her nose. Nobody, including Polly, seems to see anything improper in this intimacy.

In an era when the touch of an ungloved hand breached the boundaries of propriety unless the persons involved shared long familiarity, Hugh and Polly's forced interactions behind closed doors should put them in an awkward position. To offer succour to a person in need is expected; for Hugh to unbidden continue touching a woman to whom he is not engaged, is asking for her reputation to be ruined. Fortunately for the two, it never occurs to the crew on board the frigate to so much as send a wondering glance in their direction. Every last British soldier is nobly compassionate and innocent of a single ungentlemanly thought. Or do they consider Polly a child?

If Polly had been shown to be Hugh’s equal in some way during the voyage, or even if she had directly solicited his touch, the historical unlikelihood of their obliviousness to social etiquette would have bothered me less; Regencylandia is amply peopled by characters who behave according to modern standards. But throughout most of the book Polly is shown as someone in dire need of protection, weak and defenseless. With the steep age gap added, and little explanation of exactly how and why Hugh’s care-giving has developed into a wish to father her children – “Maybe it was the wistful way Polly Brandon had spoken of snapdragons” (p. 66) – the imbalance in their relationship leaned toward the unhealthy for me from the beginning.

It does not help that Polly is the romance version of a Disney heroine. From her first moments in Oporto (now Porto), children and distrustful young rape victims (casualties of French war atrocities) flock to her like the animals in the forest to Snow White. When she is enlisted for solitary night duty in the the hospital wing where the rape victims reside, she is immediately able to soothe their nightmares and calm them back to sleep with “her tender sympathy” (page 109) without any prior instruction or experience. Moreover, the matter of Polly’s illegitimacy seems to serve no plot purpose other than to make her doubt a man like Hugh would want her as wife. Hugh dismisses any thought of her birth being an issue from his head the moment it occurs to him.

As for Hugh, his full name was a source of a distraction for me. When I learned that the hero of Marrying The Royal Marine is called Hugh Philippe Junot, I was intrigued yet not very pleasantly amused. Intrigued, because a British officer with a French name in a story that plays out in the midst of the Napoleonic Wars raises the possibility of interesting internal conflicts; perhaps torn loyalties of some sort? Indeed, there is a justifiable plot reason for naming him thus, although it is a decidedly unexciting one. I was also unpleasantly amused. Deliberately or not, “Philippe Junot” evokes associations to the relationship between the young Princess Caroline of Monaco and a seventeen years older Frenchman by the name of, yes, Philippe Junot. (This much-gossiped-about marriage lasted two years.)

Speaking of the Napoleonic Wars. The brutish conduct of French troops during the Peninsular War has been documented, and Kelly exploits this for Marrying The Royal Marine. In her description of the violence of war and its consequences not only for the fighting troops but the women and children of occupied areas, she enters territory few currently writing historical romance writers have dared explore. It brings blood-soaked realism and plenty of emotional drama to the story, and Marrying The Royal Marine is, I think, the stronger for it.

Yet there is a glaring discrepancy in the general portrayal of the French versus the British (the Portuguese play only a supporting role in the story) that diminished Kelly’s accomplishment for me. For more than half the novel the word “French” rarely appears without appendages such as "murderous" or "raping"; and once French characters enter the story, they live down to history with gusto. By contrast, the British are depicted as honourable, brave, and self-sacrificing to the last man. There is not a hint anywhere, as the war is discussed, that would indicate rueful awareness that British soldiers might ever, somewhere, have committed similar offenses. In an early nineteenth-century teenage girl such as Polly this naivety is understandable, but in a veteran officer from an expanding colonial power it smacks of double standards or obtuseness, especially after he has regaled Polly with stories of his campaigns in India. By the time glimpses of redemption began to be seen in one of the French characters I had lost so much patience with the overall black and white characterisations that I no longer cared much.

Incidentally, up until page 167, the point at which I started skimming, nobody had bothered ruminating on the fact that neither the British nor the French do, in fact, belong in Portugal. (The Portuguese, on their part, were in the same period colonising Brazil.) Historically, the Portuguese were forced to remind the British of this when, after peace had been concluded and the French had withdrawn from the country, the British decided to remain as administrators. The Portuguese kicked them out eight years after the events described in Marrying The Royal Marine – a rebellion which started in Oporto.

Finally, when an author decides to pinpoint a specific location for his or her story, it helps me enormously as a reader to immerse myself in the setting if I receive some descriptions of scenery. Unfortunately, all I got were building names and Portuguese words paired with trite declarations like “the view of Oporto took his breath away” and “I have never seen anything so magnificent” and “the canyon was breathtaking in its wild beauty”. The army hospital of Oporto is situated in a convent, and one nun in particular becomes a prominent supporting character, but since not even the Order was specified, I was unable to visualize her person clearly (her face, yes). Social customs of the Portuguese are not entered into other than in connection with the attitude toward rape victims. For any idea of what Oporto may have looked like, other than the presence of the River Douro, I had to look up photographs. One of the rare descriptions is of an old chapel (page 96), which contains an error that conflates several centuries of mediaeval history : “[...] incense-darkened ceiling, low and decidedly pre-gothic. What did they pray about then? Polly asked herself. The Black Death?”

After this litany of complaints it should be obvious to anyone who has not yet expired from apoplectic outrage (the author has acquired an iconic status among many romance readers) that I and Marrying The Royal Marine failed to connect on any level. Although One Good Turn is one of my favourite Regencies, and Carla Kelly’s compassionate characters and touching tales of redemption have resonated deeply with me in the past, I have come to see that my tastes align only randomly with her writing. I regret that this was not one of those times.

India: Blood Moon Over Bengal by Morag McKendrick Pippin

Reading Blood Moon Over Bengal by Morag McKendrick Pippin was a schizophrenic experience for me. On one hand, a well-plotted mystery and the author’s adept handling of a time period and setting unusual in romances set the stage for an absorbing historical romantic suspense. On the other, caricatures rather than characters run the show, led by a self-centred heroine and cliched, foul-mannered hero. My intitial admiration curdled into tight-lipped determination to hang on to the end for the sake of the resolution to the mystery.

 

1932. When British heiress Elizabeth Mainwarring pilots a decrepit plane onto a military parade ground in Calcutta (Bengal, India) Major Nigel Covington-Singh is struck by her beauty and the regrettable fact that she is the daughter of his regiment’s commanding officer.

Even the fact that his father is the Maharaja of Kashmir and that he himself excels at his chosen profession does not make Nigel’s half-Indian, half-British heritage acceptable in colonial society. Elizabeth has more modern ideas, but convincing others that race is immaterial in matters of the heart becomes harder than ever as a series of gruesome murders increase racial tensions.

 

Morag McKendrick Pippin uses her considerable storytelling ability to good effect in her debut book. At its best, Blood Moon Over Bengal offers both absorbing drama and nicely honed suspense. My only quibble in regards to the latter is that after much has been made of the latest technical equipment and information-gathering from the four corners of the world, the method in which the mystery is actually solved is lame and unworthy of the well-plotted and well-paced intrigue. The author nevertheless displays one of her key strengths in infusing the resulting scene with drama that keeps the suspense afloat. Drawing on its setting and period, the mystery plot is integral to the story and a provides plenty of opportunities for social commentary, too. More about that later.

The descriptions of the British haunts in Calcutta brings the colonial setting to entertaining life. The author’s choice of emphasis does tend to conjure up a world where all anybody does all day long is imbibe alcohol and engage in extra-marital or otherwise secret affairs. British slang is thrown about with every breath the characters take, whatever the age, race, sex, or nationality of the person. At one point, Elizabeth and her best friend Fiona can hardly speak a sentence without calling each other “old thing”. If local idioms or slang are used, they eluded me entirely. (In other respects, apart from some stilted dialogue due to clunky exposition, men constantly raking their fingers through their hair in frustration or staring at women’s breasts, and repetitious sexual imagery, the prose is remarkably polished and confident for a debut book.)

While Blood Moon over Bengal is steeped in evocative detail about everything from period fashions to plants and the weather, the novel aims to steer clear of non-discriminating nostalgia for the Raj. An impatient determination on the author’s part not to put up with nonsense flavours the racial discourse, and it is perhaps forgiveable that this refusal to whitewash or sweep issues under the carpet in parts results in rather heavyhanded execution. While racial prejudices on the British side are well-illustrated and permeate the book – slurs such as wog, eight-anna, and cheechee are used judicially to showcase it – the lack of nuance in its strength or expression became a problem for me. Together with the author’s predilection for stereotyping this oversimplification/exaggeration helped reduce potentially interestingly flawed portraits to black and white caricatures. Except for the heroine and hero, their two sidekicks, and the Maharani, who are effortlessly broad-minded, everybody else thinks, feels, and reacts alike. Characters have energy but remain static and nobody really grows, develops, or learns anything.

In one scene the author’s judgment does falter quite startlingly. In an outburst of aggression Nigel identifies civilised restraint with British culture and primitive violence with his Indian heritage: “I am too Anglo to carve an unarmed man to shreds with my kukri [knife]. Insult Miss Mainwarring again, and I will indulge in a more primitive practice my Indian half is not above carrying out.” Additionally, of the only two Indian female characters in Blood Moon Over Bengal, one is a cardboard example of the Evil Other Woman, and the second is forced, through her torn loyalties, into the role of victim. While a few male full-blooded Indians show up in the story, they are barely given any voice. The Indian independence movement is alluded to but it does not assume any prominence in the story.

The issue of characterisation brings me to one of my biggest problems with Blood Moon Over Bengal: its treatment of women. It seems every female who is not friendly with or impressed by the heroine is called whore, tart, cow, shrew, harlot, slag, biddy, cat, bint, or bitch – frequently by the hero and heroine. I lost count of how many are described as catty, intolerant, shallow, and snobbish. (Namecalling where male characters are concerned is confined to “cad”.) Meanwhile, the heroine wears shorts to a polo match, makes assignations with male strangers after dark, sleeps with a man she is not sure wants, scorns the customs, conventions, and traditions of the society in which she is a temporary guest, downs alcohol as if her liver is made of immortal material, insists on lunching in a disreputable area where she proceeds to laugh at her companions’ discomfort about a nearby brothel (Blood Moon Over Bengal takes place in 1932), and in one instance says “I’d like to give the stupid cow a jolly good slap across her smug face”. Unlike the aforementioned women, we are told she is simply being admirably bold, unconventional, and brave. While Elizabeth does display moments of pluck, in perilous situations this woman who successfully pilots a wreck of an airplane in chapter one goes limp with paralysis and has to be rescued at the crucial moment.

Details of women’s clothing and makeup, frequently including brand names, form a major part of the visual props the author itemizes. On a historical level, I found these notes interesting but as a part of the characterizations they began to grate. It is constantly implied that other women, especially non-friendy acquaintances, never look half as splendid as Elizabeth. The one well-dressed exception is a character whose portrayal is among the most damning in the book. Even in the case of her close friend, “Elizabeth couldn’t help wondering why Fiona either possessed exquisite taste in her clothing selections or roared off on peculiar tangents, bent on curdling one’s digestion”. In Elizabeth Mainwarring we have a heroine who must be admired at the expense of every woman in her vicinity. Only the hero’s mother escapes unfavourable comparison, but even she is made to pay the heroine’s specialness due tribute: the Maharani quickly invites Elizabeth to “’cease this ‘ma’am’ and ‘Royal Highness’ nonsense’” and call her “’Vanessa’”.

Anachronistic attitudes are evident in conversation topics (money, prostitution, bathing – anything goes) and behaviour of the sexes toward each other (little to distinguish it from the 21st century). Apart from Elizabeth’s wardrobe not much marks her as a pre-WWII woman. A belated concern about the risk of becoming pregnant and the desire for a permanent relationship in the form of marriage were hardly unique to the 1930s. Moreover, after spouting thoroughly modern ideas about bi-racial relationships and ridiculing the narrow-mindedness and racism of British society in Calcutta, she is shocked – shocked, I tell you! – to discover that her half-Indian, Kashmiri lover is, in fact, Hindu. The instant she learns this she begins to (figuratively) wring her hands in despair about the cultural obstacles in her and Nigel’s path, and becomes reluctant to commit to a future with him. This plot point could have contributed to Elizabeth’s growth but instead of teaching Elizabeth something about self-awareness or humility, for example, it is simply used as an obstacle to keep the lovers apart.

Then again, Elizabeth seems to misplace her brain any time she runs into Nigel. She wants Nigel to tell her that he is in love with her, refusing to confess her own love first because that would be clingy behaviour. When he does, she resents him for not expressing his love in a manner she finds acceptable. When he proposes, she immediately assumes that he wants to marry her only because they slept together, and calls him a cad. These two jump to conclusions every chance they get and relish making assumptions about each other. If not for Nigel’s apologies (exasperatingly, Elizabeth is made out to be the injured one) and sorting out of their poor communication styles, Elizabeth would be on her way to her newly inherited sheep station in New Zealand, intent on treasuring her self-image as a broken-hearted martyr.

Why does Nigel fall in love with Elizabeth? Your guess is as good as mine. He just is, and he would die for her. Of course, as the person assigned to lead the investigation of the Calcutta murders he also knows which suspect is not guilty. How? Well, he assures his investigative team, “my instincts tell me he is not our murderer”. Okay, then. The best I can say for him is that except where Elizabeth is concerned he usually thinks – and yes, despite his dependence on his “instincts” he does know how to reason - before he acts. Unsurprisingly, however, it is not his investigative techniques or deductions that lead to the capture of the killer/s.

The vagueness of Nigel’s background and his thinly fleshed out, cliched personality disappointed me. But much worse was his hypocrisy. A sexually sophisticated man, he looks forward to teaching Elizabeth everything about the delights of sex. Every time he looks at Elizabeth his eyes are described as either “smouldering” or “glowing”, and while still barely acquainted with each other he boldly conveys his lustful feelings for her in his expression, in his speech, and in his actions. Yet when he receives advances from the other women who pursue him, he behaves like a boor, treating them with open contempt, calling one a tart to her face, the other a shrew. Charming. He is actually joined by most men in Blood Moon Over Bengal in this behaviour; it is typical of how they talk about, address, and think about women.

Both the hero and heroine reason that keeping vital information from each other is noble. In Nigel’s case, Elizabeth must not know that the murderer/s seem to have targeted her next because he refuses to have her be frightened. In Elizabeth’s case, Nigel must never, ever know that she loves him before he has declared his love, because saying it first would show her as the kind of clingy woman she despises (which is why she must never, ever call him on the phone either). This couple's romance left me highly doubtful about their ability to survive a lifetime together.

As Blood Moon Over Bengal unfolded I had to look harder and harder for one likeable character. Fiona came close. Cheerful and sensible, she and an older woman, a plantation owner, are the two voices of reason and perspective in the book. But in the end Fiona, too, lost some of her decency. Although other readers may feel the circumstances warrant it, I could not swallow how she laughs “in delight”, uttering “’I do love a bloodthirsty man!’” after somebody expresses a wish to “see how far the slag will stretch on the rack”. (Similarly disturbing to me, after the father of a suspected rape victim says, in an outpouring of understandably grief-struck rage, “Do you realise how anxious I am to crush that craven bastard’s throat”, he adds “I get hard thinking about it”.)

My final verdict about Blood Moon Over Bengal calls to mind Longfellow’s (?) poem about the little girl with the curl: When she was good, she was very good indeed, but when she was bad...

In Blood Moon Over Bengal author Morag McKendrick Pippin has created a sense of time and place that drew me in as if I was there. Much more successfully than Meredith Duran’s otherwise excellent The Duke Of Shadows, which also features a half-Indian, half-British hero, she places the realities of racial prejudice at the front and centre of the story. There is no doubt in my mind that McKendrick Pippin can write. When my reading enjoyment was ruined by off-putting characterizations including an I’m-SO-the-fairest-of-them-all heroine and a bigoted male protagonist it was the author’s storytelling verve and talent for plotting an intriguing mystery that prevented the book from being tossed aside unfinished. With a radically different set of characters and some grey between all the black and white, Blood Moon Over Bengal could have been a winner.

Books of related interest: In fiction, M.M. Kaye's romantic suspense novels set in 1940s India are classics of the genre. I can wholeheartedly recommend both Death In Kashmir (the revised edition of Death Walks In Kashmir) and Death In The Andamans (the revised edition of Night On The Island). The author belonged to the Raj, and her love and inside knowledge of India and its British residents permeates the stories. For a non-fictional account, Women Of The Raj: The Mothers, Wives, and Daughters of the British Empire in India provides a more nuanced portrait of its subject than Blood Moon Over Bengal.

France: The Making Of A Duchess by Shana Galen

While France is one of my favourite settings the country is rarely featured in romances except as a source of villainy and trauma for regencies. Meredith Duran’s latest historical, Wicked Becomes You, thankfully breaks with tradition but even so both of her protagonists are British. When I found out that The Making Of A Duchess by Shana Galen features a French hero and partially takes place in France, I pounced.

 

1801. Governess Sarah Smith is coerced into into posing as Serafina Artois, the daughter of long-vanished friends of the Harcourts. Her mission is to find evidence that incriminates the French émigré, Julien de Harcourt, Duc de Valère, as a traitor. But just how far does the Foreign Office expect her to take her patriotic loyalties?

Although Julien realises that his frequent trips to France are drawing the attention of the British authorities, he refuses to stop searching for his brothers, missing since the beginning of the Revolution. When Julien discovers that Serafina Artois holds information that may prove of use to his search, he becomes determined to keep her close by his side. Very close.

 

The pretty cover of The Making Of A Duchess shows a couple standing on a rolling lawn, a lofty, French-style château in the distance behind them. The style of the woman’s robin’s egg blue dress indicates a late 18th century time period. Annoyingly, the back blurb does nothing to correct these impressions. The major part of the story is set in London in 1801, and the late-coming French episode (consisting of 51 pages) takes place in the dark, dangerous (and generic) streets of Paris. Since misleading romance covers are commonplace I was not too surprised, but I was disappointed.

The best portion of the book is its gripping, emotional first chapter in which Revolutionaries (a term not used by the author who invariably prefers “peasants”, and who chooses to write only a single sympathetic “lower class” character – a person devoted to nobles) storm and burn the château of the Harcourts, and only Julien and his mother manage to flee. What this opening promised was the book I had hoped to read, but the rest of the story does not come close to living up to its intensity nor its excitement.

Instead, I got the most witless heroine I can remember reading about in years, shallow plotting that requires swallowing implausible scenarios, and inept foreshadowing that effectively gives away the outcome to any plot questions. The flawed technique grated on me throughout the novel. For example, the resolution to a major plot point concerning the heroine’s background, which has been made much of, is related in a flashback. Although the answer had been telegraphed from the start, its revelation would entail significant emotional and social consequences; yet, the matter is treated like an afterthought.

On the positive side, the prose flows smoothly, and there is a genuine sweetness to the overall tone of the book that felt agreeable and soothed me into toleration. As Sarah is a well-meaning character who does shows nascent signs of brain activity toward the end, I managed to live with her insipidity. Julien is good-natured and kind, making him an appealing beta hero, and the pair’s romance is gentle and pleasant. The use of French is generally correct but not always idiomatic. Which reminds me: why is an aristocrat born in France of French parents called Serafina, not Séraphine?

On closing The Making Of A Duchess I found I had little to say. Its predictability induced some eye-rolling, its sweetness some smiles. Although the French flavour all but disappears under the heavy English Regency overlay, I commend Shana Galen for the refreshing choice of making her hero French. Would I pick up the next book in the trilogy? Depends on the Frenchness-factor. For that rare taste in a romance, I might make an effort to focus on the positives. But not before I have leafed through sample pages in a bookshop.